Adobe
has launched a new beta version of its Flash Player. The new version
is 10.2
beta and it is available on Windows, Linux, and Mac
computers right now on Adobe
Labs. The new beta includes Stage Video which is a new API that
has best in class video playback performance across platforms. The
beta also has support for hardware acceleration in IE9.

Other
new features include enhanced text rendering, native mouse cursors
API along, and support for full screen playback with multiple
monitors. Stage Video is one of the most important things in the new
beta version and promises to allow websites to deliver smooth video
to a number of different devices and access hardware acceleration for
the entire video pipeline.

Adobe writes, "Working
together with hardware vendors has helped us take advantage of the
GPU to offload not only H.264 hardware decoding (introduced in Flash
Player 10.1) but the rest of the video rendering pipeline, including
color conversion, scaling, and blitting. How efficient is hardware
acceleration in Flash Player 10.2 beta? Using Stage Video, we’ve
seen laptops play smooth 1080p HD video with just over 0% CPU
usage."

Stage video will work with all existing video
viewed in Flash Player according to Adobe once the new API is used in
the video player SWFs. Adobe notes that YouTube has already started
to add early support for Stage Video. Using IE9, Adobe claims that
some tests have shown up to 35% improvement in rendering performance.
The final release of Flash Player 10.2 is expected for next
year.

Adobe notes, "We’ve found the beta to be pretty
stable and ready for broad testing, but keep in mind this is a
pre-release version of Flash Player, so not everything will be fully
baked. If you encounter any issues, please file a bug in our public
database so we can investigate. We appreciate your help and
feedback."

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